PITCHING`S DEEP IN HEART OF TEXAS

Ray Parrillo, Knight-Ridder NewspapersCHICAGO TRIBUNE

The kid is 6 feet 3 inches tall, weighs 200 pounds and throws a searing fastball that is consistently clocked in the 94-mile-an-hour range.

The kid`s name is Greg Landry. Doug Gassaway, a scout who uncovered baseball gems for the Philadelphia Phillies for 15 years and now bird-dogs for the Texas Rangers, says Landry had the liveliest arm among amateur pitchers in the country this year.

''The best arm I saw,'' Gassaway said in a Texas accent thicker than barbecue sauce. ''Problem with the boy is he don`t throw strikes. But if he ever learns, watch out.''

Landry didn`t learn to throw strikes at the University of Texas this past season, so despite his Roger Clemens build and laser-beam fastball, he played only a bit part for the Longhorns of Cliff Gustafson, a legendary coach.

When Landry expressed an interest in returning to the Longhorns next season, Gustafson advised him to turn professional instead. Last month, Landry was drafted in the fifth round by the Milwaukee Brewers.

''and I couldn`t foresee him doing that here. He pitched only seven innings for me this year, and I couldn`t see him breaking into our rotation next year. ''So I told him he`d be better off in pro ball, in the low minors, where winning and losing don`t matter much. That`s the monster we`ve created here.'' This monster of a baseball program at Texas has been cranking out pro pitchers as consistently as the Lone Star state spouts oil.

There are seven pitchers in the major leagues who played for the Longhorns, more than any other college or university has produced.

Two of them, Boston`s Clemens and Cleveland`s Greg Swindell, are leading contenders for the American League`s Cy Young Award. The others are Bruce Ruffin of the Phillies, Calvin Schiraldi and Mike Capel of the Cubs, Jerry Don Gleaton of Kansas City and Jim Acker of Atlanta.

Most major-league managers would take their chances with those seven on his staff.

Clemens, Schiraldi, Ruffin and Capel were on the staff in 1983, when the Longhorns won the College World Series. Although eight of those pitchers are in pro ball at some level, Gustafson said the group might not have been his best.

''In `70, I had Burt Hooton, Larry Hardy, Mike Beard and James Street,''

Gustafson recalled. ''Street was the ace of the staff, but he was a great football player and he decided not to go in the (baseball) draft.''

Several other Longhorns are in the minors, including Mike Poehl, Cleveland`s No. 1 draft choice in 1985, who is considered a strong big-league prospect.

And there are no indications that the Texas pipeline is about to run dry any time soon. Earlier this month, for instance, three pitchers from Gustafson`s staff were drafted. In addition to Landry, Preston Watson went in the third round to Atlanta and Eric Stone in the sixth round to Detroit.

None was the ace of the staff. That title belonged to a right-hander named Kirk Dressendorfer, who was named Southwest Conference player of the year even though he was only a freshman.

Dressendorfer, a 5-11, 180-pounder from Pearland, Tex., (all the Longhorns` big-league pitchers are native Texans) was 15-2, had an ERA of 2.26 and averaged a strikeout an inning.

''That kid`s outstanding,'' Gassaway said. ''He`s not as big as Clemens or Swindell, but he`s got the same velocity and an excellent breaking ball. There`s a good chance he`ll be a first-rounder in two years.''

A collegian must either complete his junior year of eligibility or turn 21 to be eligible for the draft.

''Dressendorfer will pitch in the big leagues,'' Gustafson said. ''So will Watson, who could get there real soon.''

Southern Cal has its tailbacks, Penn State its linebackers and Texas its pitchers.

At its annual alumni game last February at Disch-Falk Field, a pristine jewel of a stadium named after former coaches ''Uncle Billy'' Disch and Bibb Falk, Gustafson limited the participants to active pros. Thirty of them turned out, 18 of them pitchers. So did an overflow crowd of about 7,000, despite subfreezing temperatures.

''It was 29 degrees when the game started and we still couldn`t fit everybody into the stadium,'' Gustafson said. ''The fans hang around for hours, waiting for autographs. It`s quite a deal.''

Is there something revolutionary about Gustafson`s program that enables it to pump out all those golden arms?

''Yeah, the secret is to go out and recruit good arms,'' Gustafson said with a laugh.

Gustafson`s philosophy, and he`s hesitant even to call it that, is simple: Harvest the wealth of talent the state produces, tell the pitchers to junk the slop pitches and lean heavily on the fastball, run them until they drop, put an enormous amount of pressure on each pitcher to produce, and make all of them throw strikes. Always, throw strikes.

Gustafson, 57, doesn`t coddle his pitchers. Once he feels his pitchers are in shape, he`ll let them throw until they simply can`t any longer. He has no time for statistical minutiae such as quality starts, which occur when a starting pitcher allows three runs or fewer in six innings.

''Cliff handles 90 percent of the pitching over there, and his theory is out of the old school,'' said Gassaway, a longtime friend of Gustafson`s.

''He`s not into counting pitches like they do in the big leagues. He`ll let a kid throw 150 pitches if the kid`s still effective. His secret is repetition. In the fall, he makes them play games every day rather than just workouts. Everything he does involves game conditions.

''And it works. I`ve seen kids go there with average fastballs who come out with excellent fastballs because Cliff knows how to make their arms get stronger. And you do that just by throwing a lot. But maybe the biggest reason Cliff`s been so good for baseball is that he makes kids winners. If anything, those kids who come out of that program know how to win.''

There aren`t many coaches on any level of any sport who win with the frequency of Cliff Gustafson. This year, Gustafson became only the third NCAA baseball coach to surpass 1,000 victories. The two others, Rod Dedeaux of Southern Cal and Ron Fraser of Miami, needed five more years than Gustafson to reach that plateau.

In 21 years at Texas, Gustafson`s record is a stunning 1,049-223-2, a winning percentage of .825. His teams have won two College World Series and 19 Southwest Conference titles, and have played in the College World Series 14 times.

This year, the Longhorns went 58-11-1. But they didn`t make it to the World Series, which consists of the final eight teams, so it was considered a down year in Austin.

Gustafson`s teams have run up mind-boggling numbers without producing a major-league hitter more notable than Keith Moreland. ''Gusball'' means winning with good pitching, a solid double-play combination and a center-fielder who can run to the Gulf of Mexico to shag a fly ball.

Gustafson said he would remain at Texas until retirement, or until he was fired.

Fired?

''Hey, if we don`t win, I`m gone,'' he said. ''It`s a monster.''

It`s a monster, all right. A monster that keeps feeding pitchers to the big leagues.